U.S. Becomes a Food Stamp Nation While CEO's are Paid More Than in 2007

“But I didn’t know what else to do

and I got to a point where I swallowed

my pride and decided to do

what was best for my daughter.”

Meanwhile, the typical pay package

for the head of a company in the

Standard & Poor's 500 was $9 million in 2010

Capitol Hill Blue
By Krintina Cooke
August 23, 2011

Genna Saucedo supervises cashiers at a Wal-Mart in Pico Rivera, California, but her wages aren’t enough to feed herself and her 12-year-old son.

Saucedo, who earns $9.70 an hour for about 26 hours a week and lives with her mother, is one of the many Americans who survive because of government handouts in what has rapidly become a food stamp nation.

Altogether, there are now almost 46 million people in the United States on food stamps, roughly 15 percent of the population. That’s an increase of 74 percent since 2007, just before the financial crisis and a deep recession led to mass job losses.

At the same time, the cost doubled to reach $68 billion in 2010 — more than a third of the amount the U.S. government received in corporate income tax last year — which means the program has started to attract the attention of some Republican lawmakers looking for ways to cut the nation’s budget deficit.

While there are clearly some cases of abuse by people who claim food stamps but don’t really need them, for many Americans like Saucedo there is little current alternative if they are to put food on the table while paying rent and utility bills.

“It’s kind of sad that even though I’m working that I need to have government assistance. I have asked them to please put me on full-time so I can have benefits,” said the 32-year-old.
She’s worked at Wal-Mart for nine months, and applied for food stamps as soon as her probation ended. She said plenty of her colleagues are in the same situation.

So are her customers. Bill Simon, head of Wal-Mart’s U.S. operations, told a conference call last Tuesday that the company had seen an increase in the number of shoppers relying on government assistance for food.

About forty percent of food stamp recipients are, like Saucedo, in households in which at least one member of the family earns wages. Many more could be eligible: the government estimates one in three who could be on the program are not.

“If they’re working, they often think they can’t get help. But people can’t support their families on $10, $11, $12 an hour jobs, especially when you add transport, clothes, rent.” said Carolyn McLaughlin, executive director of BronxWorks, a social services organization in New York.

The maximum amount a family of four can receive in food stamps is $668 a month. They can only be used to buy food — though not hot food — and for plants and seeds to grow food.

Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama all made efforts to raise awareness about the program and remove the stigma associated with it.

In 2004, paper coupons were replaced with cards similar to debit cards onto which benefits can be loaded. In 2008 they were renamed Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits though most people still call them food stamps.

Despite the bipartisan support for the program in the past, some of the recent political rhetoric has food stamp advocates worried.

Presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich last year derided Democrats as “the party of food stamps”. And Republican leaders in the House of Representatives propose changing the program so that the funding is through a “block grant” to the states, rather than allowing it to grow automatically when needed due to an emergency, such as a natural disaster or economic crisis. The rest of the story...

Obama could raise $1 billion for re-election ("yes we can") and yet 44.2 million on food stamps ("let me be clear...")

44.2 million Americans receiving food stamps,

average monthly benefit of $132.81 and

the 2012 election will exceed $1 billion

(single election equivalent of providing monthly food stamps

for an entire year to 625,000 people)

Politico
By Jennifer Epstein and
Glenn Thrush
April 4, 2011

President Barack Obama launched his 2012 reelection campaign on Monday morning with a video testimonial from voters posted on his website and an email to supporters, echoing his innovative and oft-copied 2008 kickoff.

By inaugurating what could be the first $1 billion campaign in history so early, Obama has gotten the jump on a scattered GOP field reluctant to take the plunge and hits the starting line months earlier than George W. Bush did for his 2004 reelection bid.

The video – entitled “It Begins With Us” – is an effort to rekindle the grassroots fervor that propelled Obama into office and seemed to be a tacit acknowledgement that many of his supporters have been disappointed by the stuttering pace of change and the compromises Obama has made in the last two-and-half years.

The two-minute clip features a series of interviews with voters from around the country explaining why they plan to support the president. It doesn’t include Obama’s voice or any new film footage of him. But it was quickly followed by an Obama email in which the president explained the early start to the campaign.

“We’re doing this now because the politics we believe in does not start with expensive TV ads or extravaganzas, but with you — with people organizing block-by-block, talking to neighbors, co-workers, and friends,” Obama writes, explaining why the launch is coming more than 19 months before Election Day.

“And that kind of campaign takes time to build.”

Today’s announcement puts Obama well ahead of any potential Republican opponent in making his intentions clear. The lack of a clear GOP frontrunner so late in the cycle and the unwillingness of any potential opponent to commit is seen as a mixed blessing by Obama’s political brain trust.

On one hand, Republican disunity is always a plus for a sitting Democrat. On the other hand, the lack of an opponent forces the president to have a conversation about himself with himself – denying him the chance to contrast his record with that of a living, breathing conservative foil.

The launch also comes at middling moment of the Obama presidency. The economy is rebounding but still bad; Afghanistan and Iraq are winding down but Obama has accepted an ill-defined new mission in Libya; and the polls show him in the 42-to-48 percent approval range, basically where he’s been for most of his time in the White House. Complete article, please keep reading

$21.3 Billion Food Budget Shortfall for Americans at Risk of Hunger

CHICAGO, March 24, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Feeding America, the nation's largest domestic hunger-relief organization, today released a landmark study, "Map the Meal Gap," providing insight for the first time about the number of meals missing from the tables of American families struggling with hunger each year – an estimated 8.4 billion nationwide.

The findings of "Map the Meal Gap" are based on statistics collected by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, U.S. Census Bureau, and food price data and analysis provided by The Nielsen Company, a global information and measurement company providing insights into what consumers watch and buy. The study was supported by The Howard G.Buffett Foundation and Nielsen.

According to U.S. Census Bureau Current Population Survey data, people struggling with hunger estimate they would need about $56 more each month on average during the months that they are food insecure to address the shortages in their food budget. On a national level, "Map the Meal Gap" shows this shortfall represents an estimated $21.3 billion on an annual basis.

In a departure from the standard of measuring meals in pounds, "Map the Meal Gap" estimates the relative cost of a meal, adjusting the national average of $2.54 per meal that food secure people report they usually spend on an average meal, according to food prices in each county.

"Map the Meal Gap" also provides critical information that has never been previously available -- food insecurity rates for each county and Congressional District. Previously, food insecurity data was only available at the state level in the USDA's annual report. The study further analyzes each county's food insecure population to determine their income eligibility for federal nutrition assistance. This data has the potential to redefine the way service providers and policy makers address areas of need.

"We know hunger exists in every state across the nation, but it looks different from county to county, and therefore, so do the solutions. The results of this study show that the best way for us to help people facing hunger is to understand who is hungry and why they are hungry at the community level," said Vicki Escarra, president and CEO of Feeding America.

"Together, the emergency food system and critical federal nutrition programs weave a comprehensive nutrition safety net reaching at-risk Americans at different income bands and in different settings, with special focus on vulnerable child and senior populations."

"There is no 'one size fits all' solution for hunger. For example, in Pulaski County, which is at the southern tip of Illinois, more than 20 percent of the population is food insecure. Of those individuals, 63 percent are potentially eligible for enrollment in the SNAP program (formerly known as the Food Stamp Program). This sample alone shows just how significant SNAP can be for many communities in this country," said Escarra.

"But in Lake County Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, 54 percent of the food insecure population does not qualify for food stamps or other government programs, so they often must rely on Feeding America and other charities to help feed themselves and their families."

"Map the Meal Gap" provides the following data for each county in the United States in an interactive map format available online:

• The percentage of the population who is food insecure.
• The percentage of the food insecure population who qualify based on income for SNAP (foods stamps) and other federal nutrition programs.
• The percentage of the food insecure population who do NOT qualify for federal nutrition programs and often must rely on charitable food assistance programs and who also need better wages and employment opportunities to help them meet their basic needs.
• The average price per meal in each county, based on new research by The Nielsen Company.

Complete Press Release

Agricultural Committee Prefers Cuts to Food Stamps VS Farm Subsidies

...most large commercial farmers report an

average annual income of $200,000,

well in excess of the national average

Chairman Frank Lucas, R-Okla., has reported $445,714 in

 political contributions from the agricultural industry during

the course of his career, and ranking Democrat Collin Peterson

 of Minnesota reports $809,097 in career donations.

It appears Food Stamp recipients do not contribute enough

to their elected representatives

National Journal
by Tim Fernholz
March 21, 2011

The House Agriculture Committee endorsed a letter this week to Budget Chairman Paul Ryan arguing that the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which helps low-income Americans purchase food, would make a better target for cuts than automatic subsidies to farms.

The move comes as food prices are rising -- the Department of Agriculture expects overall food prices to rise 3 percent to 4 percent this year -- making it harder for the beneficiaries of SNAP to stretch their existing benefits, even as farmers profit from the tightening market. Critics across the political spectrum have called agricultural subsidies wasteful and unnecessary, and they question the logic of maintaining them as lawmakers hunt for budget cuts.

"Conspicuously missing from the list of mandatory spending cuts the Agriculture Committee has made or is proposing to make are commodity subsidies, and specifically the $4.9 billion in direct payments that are automatically paid out each year regardless of whether a person farms,” said Jake Caldwell, the director of agricultural policy at the left-leaning Center for American Progress. “It is shortsighted of the Committee to suggest cuts to SNAP, particularly as food prices are on the rise, Americans are spending more than 10 percent of their household budget on food, and more people are enrolled in the food stamp program than ever before."

President Obama has endorsed cuts in agricultural subsidies as a way to lower the deficit without targeting essential programs, and lawmakers from both parties, like Ryan, R-Wis., have expressed similar opinions.

But the Agriculture Committee is dominated by members of Congress from farm states; Chairman Frank Lucas, R-Okla., has reported $445,714 in political contributions from the agricultural industry during the course of his career, and ranking Democrat Collin Peterson of Minnesota reports $809,097 in career donations.

The budget letter, endorsed by both Lucas and Peterson, argues that subsidies need to be in place for when record-high prices “inevitably” fall, and that higher prices have actually increased risks for farmers. But not even all farmers agree -- the Iowa Farm Bureau voted its opposition to direct payment subsidies earlier this year. Brian Riedl, a fiscal policy expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation, said that most large commercial farmers report an average annual income of $200,000, well in excess of the national average.

A Republican aide says the letters’ main message was a request that the budget committee be allowed to review its programs before final budget decisions are made, and that the programs under the committee’s jurisdiction not be cut disproportionately. Criteria for program reviews have yet to be determined.

The letter emphasizes recent reductions in the committee’s budget due to renegotiated insurance deals and higher food prices, which have reduced or temporarily eliminated the cost of some conditional subsidies. But it argues that SNAP -- which grew more expensive during the recession as unemployment increased the number of people who were eligible and as Congress expanded benefits under the economic stimulus law -- could be a target for cuts. SNAP makes up the bulk of the USDA’s budget.

Democrats stripped out some of the program’s expanded funding last year to pay for other programs, including child nutrition legislation. Now, the committee says, it will review the remaining stimulus expansions, which expire in November 2013, to see if the funds can be diverted for deficit reduction.

Democrats and Republicans are split on the value of the SNAP expansions, with the president and his party generally endorsing higher levels of spending than the GOP, which worries about a too-comfortable safety net (the program provides a monthly benefit of about $200 a person to households at or below 130 percent of the poverty level).

Anti-hunger advocates say the move to reduce food aid comes at just the wrong time. A report released by the Food Research and Action Center earlier this month said almost 1 in 5 Americans struggled to afford food for their families in 2010, with some of the highest rates of food hardship occurring just last fall.

Yet Another Sign of Our Strong Recovery: RECORD 43.2 MILLION Americans receiving Foodstamps

1/7/2011
The USDA released their SNAP (a.k.a. food stamp) usage report for October 2010 and sadly, 43.2 million Americans are receiving Food Stamp assistance (40% increase from October 20008). All told, 20.1 million households rely on food stamps in order to feed their families. The average benefit per month per person was $133.76 and an average per household benefit of $286.30.

5.5 million more Americans relied on Food Stamps in October 2010 than in October 2009. 2.9 million more households received Food Stamp assistance in October 2010 versus the same month in 2009.

During the month of October 2008, 30.8 million Americans received food stamps representing 13.9 million households.

Thanks to Zero Hedge for Copy/Paste Chart

14% of all Americans relying on food stamps to feed their families

Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)

Wall Street blew off the abysmal non-farm payroll report this morning and deemed it a fluke given the other "positive" economic reports. Wall Street will likely deem the poverty level in this country a fluke when trading commences next week. Wall Street attitude: too bad if you lost your job or lack enough food on the table to feed your family. We are Wall Street...We are God and we have the backing of the U.S. Government and specifically Bernanke to assure our success....and we eat very well!

USDA reports 42.911 million Americans using food stamps in September 2010. This is an increase of 520,000 people from August 2010 and an increase of 5.992 million (16%) Americans from September 2009. USDA reported the average benefit is $133.80. Eligibility Requirements

For the record, 42.911 million Americans on Food Stamps is a record. Roughly 14% of all Americans receive Food Stamps. USDA Data and Reports

Thanks to Zero Hedge for the Chart

First, Feed the Children

By Jeff Bridges and Bill Shore
Timesunion.com
11/23/10

As we prepare for Thanksgiving, it's hard to believe that there might be a kid on our block who doesn't know when her next meal will come. Just last week, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced that nearly one in four children struggles with hunger.

For most Americans with enough to eat, the hungry kid in our neighborhood is invisible. Hunger in the U.S. doesn't look like famine in developing countries, but its consequences are nonetheless devastating. Children who don't regularly get enough healthy food suffer behavioral difficulties, fatigue, poorer health, weaker immune systems and more hospitalizations. Hungry kids also show impaired performance in school. More than 60 percent of public school teachers identify hunger as a problem in the classroom. Many buy food for their hungry students.

We can end childhood hunger in America in this decade, maybe in the next five years. Programs are already in place. We need to get more children into them.

National food and nutrition programs can be the difference between empty stomachs and good health. Access to these programs makes economic sense. Every $5 the federal government spends on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps, generates $9.20 in local economic activity.

Every time we increase access to programs, federal funding flows into local communities. Orange County, Fla., used targeted marketing to increase summer meal participation by 76 percent last year. It was able to access more than $2 million.

Several states are following suit.

With the backing of Gov. Bill Ritter, the Colorado Campaign to End Childhood Hunger helped increase the number of summer meals served by more than 25 percent from 2009 to 2010. By successfully lobbying for legislation to expand food stamp eligibility, End Childhood Hunger Washington helped raise food stamp participation by 64 percent, reaching an additional 370,000 people. And Gov. Martin O'Malley's Partnership to End Childhood Hunger in Maryland increased the number of low-income children eating summer meals by 17.4 percent in 2009.

Share Our Strength and the End Hunger Network are collaborating with communities where leaders are realizing that until they expand participation in food programs, they are shortchanging not just their children but also our nation. Public and private sectors should work together to make programs more effective.

Help for hungry children is surely a bipartisan cause. Congress can demonstrate its commitment by passing the Healthy, Hunger Free Kids Act, which would strengthen many of the most important hunger and nutrition programs, including school breakfast and summer meals. The bill passed the Senate in August and is awaiting House action. It will be weakened if we wait for the next Congress.

We have food. It's Thanksgiving. Let's act now to ensure that all of our children eat, learn, grow and thrive.

Actor Jeff Bridges is founder of the nonprofit End Hunger Network. Bill Shore founded and is executive director of Share Our Strength, a nonprofit working to make sure no child in America grows up hungry. They wrote this for The Washington Post.

14% of Americans Rely on Food Stamps.

42, 389,619 Americans Received

Food Stamps in August 2010

17% Increase Since August 2009 and

A 50% increase since Fiscal Year 2008

(stock market has launched...do you feel fuller?)

By Sara Murray
The Wall Street Journal
11/5/10

A huge number of American households are still relying on government assistance to buy food as the recession continues to batter families.

Food stamp recipients ticked up in August, children consumed millions of free lunches and nearly five million low-income mothers tapped into a government nutrition program for women and young children.

Some 42,389,619 Americans received food stamps in August, a 17% rise from the same time a year ago, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which tracks the data. That number is up 58.5% from August 2007, before the recession began.

By population, Washington, D.C. had the largest share of residents receiving food stamps: More than a fifth, 21.1%, of its residents collected assistance in August. Washington was followed by Mississippi, where 20.1% of residents received food stamps, and Tennessee, where 20% tapped into the government nutrition program.

Idaho posted the largest jump in recipients in the past year. The number of people receiving food stamps climbed 38.8% but their rolls are still fairly low. Just 211,883 Idaho residents collected food stamps in August.

The average benefit size per person nationwide in August was $133.90. Per household it was $287.82.

Food stamps have become a lifeline for workers who have lost their jobs, particularly among the growing share of unemployed Americans who have also exhausted their unemployment benefits. Lines at grocers at midnight on the first of the month have signaled that, in many cases, those benefits aren’t tiding families over and they run out before their next check kicks in.

Even during the summer children returned to schools to take advantage of free lunch programs where they were available. Nearly 195 million lunches were dished out in August and 58.9% of them were free. Another 8.4% were available at reduced prices. That number will surge when the fall data are released because children will be back in school. Last September, for example, more than 590 million lunches were served, nearly 64% of which were free or reduced price.

Children whose families have incomes at or below 130% of the poverty level — $28,665 for a family of four — can access free meals. Those families earning between 130% and 185% of the poverty level — $40,793 for a four-person family — are eligible for reduced-price meals that can’t cost more than 40 cents.

Food Stamps hit record 41.8 million in July

41.8 Million Americans Receiving Food Stamps and

Newt Gingrich uses this sad state of affairs for politial posturing

to cast the Democratic Party as the party of food stamps

while calling the GOP the party of paychecks.

Grandpa remains politically agnostic and deems the political rhetoric associated with food stamps in order to feed one's family repulsive. Blue and Red parties need to get their act together and focus on solutions as continued party bashing does not afford our children a warm meal!

By Alan Bjerga
Oct. 5 (Bloomberg) -- The number of Americans receiving food stamps rose to a record 41.8 million in July as the jobless rate hovered near a 27-year high, the government said.

Recipients of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program subsidies for food purchases jumped 18 percent from a year earlier and increased 1.4 percent from June, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said today in a statement on its website. Participation has set records for 20 straight months.

Unemployment in September may have reached 9.7 percent, according to a Bloomberg News survey of analysts in advance of the release of last month’s rate on Oct. 8. Unemployment was 9.6 percent in July, near levels last seen in 1983.

An average of 43.3 million people, more than an eighth of the population, will get food stamps each month in the year that began Oct. 1, according to White House estimates. Participation by state chart

USDA reports 40.8 million Americans receiving food stamps (18.94 million households)

The USDA reported that 40,801,392 Americans received food stamps in the Month of May 2010. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) was utilized by 18,894,490 U.S. households.

May's usage is an increase of 371,000 people over April 2010. May 2010's figure is 6.32 million more people than May 2009 (18.6%).

The number of households receiving food stamps in May 2010 is up 3.32 million over May 2009 (21.3%). The total cost of the Food Stamp program for May 2010 was $5.458 billion versus $4.596 billion in May 2009.

The average per person benefit for the month of May 2010 was $133.77 and $288.87 per household. Total SNAP expenditures for fiscal year 2009 was $50.360 billion (an increase of $15.752 billion over fiscal year 2008).

The U.S. Census Bureau estimates the U.S. population to be 310 million in 2010 and estimates 115 million households. Based on these estimates, 13% of the American population and 16% of all U.S. households received food stamps in the month of May.

Truly a sad commentary given the resources of the United States. Another sad commentary is the potential $11+ billion cut to the food stamp program slated for 2014 as a result of the Senate "horse trading" in order to pass another $26 billion bailout to the states. Yes, our $174,000 salaried "representatives" doing what they do best...sticking it to those that are hanging on by a thread.

Their continual disregard for children and grandchildren is beyond sad.